Amazing Screenshot Thread

December 27th, 2012, 04:04

Guess I get to hog this some more. I broke down and installed a light mod. I was very nervous as I did not want to fiddle with a lot of external stuff so had avoided all of them accept Project Reality - Climate and Weather.

But after reviewing all of them for two days I picked one and so glad I did. What a difference! Screenshots just can't do justice to how utterly amazing and detailed the game looks now. Blows my mind sometimes. A few shots:

Fields outside Whiterun:

Favorite. Grim on his way to Dustmans Crypt about 5am in the morning. Sun is just coming up.

At a traders, the lighting inside was just so immersive:

Whiterun Market at night:

Arriving at night in Falkreath - roads behind grim are almost extremely dark as you get away from the light. He is looking down at some chickens in the road as the Guard holds a torch.

Awesome "Fantasy" scenery with Dragonreach as sun rises - Grim is cresting over the hilld (near the ritual stone):

Catacombs in Whiterun, Helping Andurs:

— Character is centrality, the impossibility of being displaced or overset. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

A couple more then. I am playing pretty hard core right now (well for me - nothing compared to what most of the watch does). I have disabled fast travel - I only travel by foot, horse, carriage or werewolf form. I have realistic dark nights - so either I have a torch, mage spell, werewolf form, or I sleep. I have a mod that lets you craft bed rolls (even tents) so I can sleep out in the wilderness. I have Meeko the Husky so I set him as my guard dog I also avoid all exploits, don't use trainers, don't "spam" spells to level, and stick to my characters character.

Werewolf "Night Eye" Vision. This is in the shack where Astrid chides me. Oh it is so delicious to wolf out and slap the bitch around (even if she was amusing … but I was not pleased she sent assassins after me):

A very rainy day:

A nice sunny day:

Solitude with Meeko:

Whiterun with Meeko at Night:

Some dark sneaking shots - these are best viewed full screen in a room not to bright as can be hard to see details. I love the sneaking now. Very tense.

Embershaft (sp?) Mines near Riverwood

— Character is centrality, the impossibility of being displaced or overset. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Last post for awhile (break is almost over anyhow). I still prefer RCRN but wanted to see if I could make some of the high tech screenshots. So I installed Project Reality with the Seasons of Skyrim ENB. Here are a few of the results. The ENB combined with PR: Climates, lighting and weather really made a difference in giving things that glossy look.

My favorite so far

At fishing camp, back shot:

At fishing camp, front shot:

Various scenes from the fishing camp as the sun rises:

At an Inn, back:

EDIT: And this AWESOME shot of Farkas in Ebony armor. Still can't believe this was 100% taken in game!!

— Character is centrality, the impossibility of being displaced or overset. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

I'm playing with 75 mods installed plus the texture combiner pack. I highly recommend footprints. It not only adds some immersion but I've actually tracked things by following them. Small thing but very cool.

Found a page with some nice tips. Tells you how to hide the menu quick and easy (console command tm) as well as how to free up the camera in combat so you can take great action shots (just found this so haven't had a chance to take any yet).

There is a console command to hide the menu real quick (versus going into display) and one that lets you take action shots (frees up the camera when in combat mode although it pauses the game … but great to look around for nice shots).

Enter console (~) and enter "tm" then return. This hides the menu (note it will also hide the console since this is part of the menu so you have to type "tm" blind when you want to renable the menu.

for action shots see below:

How to Take Action Shots

If you want to take action shots, you have to get fancy with the console.

The game doesn't ordinarily allow you to view your character from any angle other than from behind when you have a weapon drawn. This can make it difficult to get a good action shot. (Other than by pressing PrtSc when a fatality cut-scene plays, of course.)

You can get around this by opening the console and typing

tfc 1

then close the console by pressing the '~' again.

tfc stands for 'toggle free cam' and allows you to detach the camera from its usual position and move it around a scene using the movement keys (WASD). While the free cam is active, the action will stop and you can spend as much time as you like lining up the perfect shot. When you have the shot lined up, just use the normal methods of taking a screenshot.

When you're done with your shot, open the console again and type

tfc 0

to return the camera to its normal position.

You can combine the free cam with the no HUD option and take action shots without any HUD elements as well. Just type 'tm' after 'tfc 1'. The console will disappear, so remember to type '~' again after typing these commands to get back

— Character is centrality, the impossibility of being displaced or overset. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

So took some action shots tonight - last day of vacation so had nothing else to do and I enjoy this. This is using Seaons of Skyrim ENB 2.1 and the new ENB 0.126 along with Project Reality and Enhanced Lighting and FX.

I also used the free camera which let me zoom way out and get a "dragons" eye view of things. Any questions on pictures let me know as I am not going to list descriptors. I took 184 images and narrowed them down to some of my favorites.

— Character is centrality, the impossibility of being displaced or overset. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Discussed some things with the person who did Seasons of Skyrim, one of my favorite ENB's, which I am hoping to get working with CoT darker dungeons and nights. In the meantime I did find a good combination that worked well (although a bigger FPS hit then RCRN), which is SkyRealism Cinematic ENB combined with CoT. Here are the results.

Now that I have settled on my lighting (SoS and RCRN) I had to start over of course :-) These two shots came out particularly fine. The first is in Dead Man's Grotto ( I headed their first before I start the main quest) where I am helping Sindig. Second is a close up in stealth mode.

— Character is centrality, the impossibility of being displaced or overset. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Awesome shots in this thread wolfgrimdark - thanks for sharing! That first one in your last post is totally classic barbarian imagery - and I love how the werewolf behind him just kind of emerges out of the shadows behind him. I've never been to the Dead Man's Grotto, does it have that reddish atmosphere even in the un-modded game? Looks very cool.

Originally Posted by Myrkrel
Awesome shots in this thread wolfgrimdark - thanks for sharing! That first one in your last post is totally classic barbarian imagery - and I love how the werewolf behind him just kind of emerges out of the shadows behind him. I've never been to the Dead Man's Grotto, does it have that reddish atmosphere even in the un-modded game? Looks very cool.

I definitely want to play with some of these lighting mods sometime.

Thanks! Aye it does. It is lore as you go here on a quest for Hircine and the red comes from the large Bloodmoon in the sky. The mod tends to make colors more vibrant but the red haze is vanilla.

Everyone should know these:

Grim and his best fried

Close up of my barbarian

Edit: not sure if I showed the werewolf night eye effect, so here it is

— Character is centrality, the impossibility of being displaced or overset. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

It has been a bit all over as I was testing various DLL's. 119 was very stable so went back to that (although 130 just came out so checking it out shortly). 126 was very slow, caused tint flickering and shadow flickering and strange lighting on my characters hair (although that is more the ENB then the DLL) … anyhow 126 has been a bit problematic and also dropped my FPS.

That being said my current set up has improved to about 40 for my average. Some places gets up to max of 60 and others down to 30. This is Seasons of Skyrim 2.0 Official release using ENB v0.119 and RCRN version 3.6 set to PURE with FXAA ON, Sharpening ON, volmetric Fog OFF. Since I proxy to the RCRN DLL I am not using the sweetFX settings with the ENB.

For Skyrim configuration FXAA is off (since I use the one in RCRN) and set to ULTRA at 1920x1080 resolution, AA = 8, AF = 16, all sliders now on Max/Ultra settings.

Originally Posted by Thrasher
Thanks for the info. 30 FPS is borderline unplayable for me in an action game, and my new laptop is less powerful. Is it easy to turn off if frame rates are too bad?

I have been testing 130 and been very steady at 39-43 fps, higher indoors/dungeons.

Anyhow there are tons of options you can enable or disable to help with FPS. FXAA, SSAA, MSAA, etc. can all be fine tuned. Depth of Field, reflections, bloom, so many effects and many you just set a flag for (true or false). Different ENB's can be more or less demanding.

Also the lighting mods use the creation kit to change lighting so have no major FPS hits and may even improve performance. I like RCRN but Real Light with Customization appears to the most popular.

I found tastes are ALL OVER. So many ENB's and so much depends on personal preference. Even with my current setup which I am keeping I sometimes find DoF annoying … but since I like more than not I keep it.

ENB's can be enabled/disabled in game usually by the SHIFT+F12 command set. RCRN uses PAUSE/BREAK key. Its nice as sometimes a dungeon is two dark so I disable RCNR for a moment, or perhaps an area is two vivid with SoS so I disable that and use RCRN.

Lots of flexibility. Does take a bit of playing, reading, and testing though. For right out of the box I suggest RCRN as it is super easy to use with no performance hit for the most part.

For realism I would suggest Franks ENB which just adds DoF and better shadows and works great with RCRN. SkyRealism vanilla or Cinematic also works well. You can get some great screenshots but these setups tend to be sharper and more vanilla color systems. I like that sometimes but also like the more hazy fantasy color scheme, which I use SoS for.

Honestly I switch around on play sessions depending on mood, however I always use RCRN. I just link up the proxy to either Seasons of Skyrim or Skyrealism Cinematic - my two favorites. I have two folders with all the presets the way I want them so Its a simple matter or remove/add the contents - takes about 3 minutes.

I tend to play mostly SoS/RCRN though as I love the vibrant colors. I also use some other mods that affect a little of the lighting - darker dungeons for ENB, enhanced lights and FX, revamped exterior fog, and interior fog removal.

— Character is centrality, the impossibility of being displaced or overset. - Ralph Waldo Emerson